Palace Theatre

139 E. Granville Street,

Windsor,
NC27983

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No theaters found within 30 miles

This very charming theater was quite small yet still retained a magical quality that lived up to the name Palace. It was opened in 1928, and was gutted by a fire in October 1945. It was rebuilt and closed in the late-1960’s. The Palace Theatre was demolished in the early-1970’s.

Another lost treasure with no purpose served in its destruction since nothing ever replaced the space it occupied.

WINDSOR, N.C.-A fire, which started in the roof of the rear of the Palace, completely gutted the building, causing a loss of $35,000. The building was owned by Lewis Thompson and the theater and equipment by his son, Roy Thompson, who operated it. The theater was unoccupied.

Had friends in Windsor but never went to the movies there. The name of the theater that I used to pass escapes me, it could have been the Palace. The last that I remember of the building was it became a fruit & vegetable market.
It is something to ponder (before television and really modern cars) theaters actually thrived in these little towns that were so near each other. Some of those small towns in eastern NC are only 15 to 30 miles apart.

William Cline,David, was a film booker in the Carolinas and wrote a book basically about those small theatres in North Carolina; you might be able to google in the info on the book,i have a copy somewhere and have included some of his stories on various small town theatres in the Carolinas on CT.Empire Publishers I think in North Carolina printed the book.

Thanks Mike, I will buy a copy off amazon. Since I posted the comment it has haunted me that I might have seen one movie there at the Palace. It has never cleared my mind of having seen a Jeff Chandler movie in a small out of town theater. I had it in memory that it was “Broken Arrow” but I am remembering Chandler as a Calvary officer rather than the Indian. At least a 50 year old memory. But the main point is remembering the theater or film itself rather than the plot. I do not wish to be cruelly critical but the theater I remember had a somewhat smaller screen than I had seen before. The unusual thing about this experience is that this was the darkest color movie that I have ever seen—it was almost as if the arc was about to go out from the opening credits until the last frame. Any way, this experience involved seeing the darkest print and the most severely scratched movie that I have ever seen. I later learned from an old timer Hunter Jackson that if the projectionists was a bit on the lazy side and neglected to keep the gates and other parts of the projector clean of debris a brand new print could be totally ruined with just one trip through the machine. He also told me that a dirty print could set up a clean projector to scratch the next film to be run through. If it was “Broken Arrow” the print was probably at least 15 years old then and had coursed its way through many projectors of all conditions..

Yep,I knew a few old Projectionists that were working on a hobby during work instead of tending to business,often if we would get a second or third run on a film we would blame the scratches from coming from the DRive-ins,but according your facts often a\"Lazy\" operator in a first run house could ruin a print way before the Drive-in played it.Cline’s Book is pretty good .I met him several times at the Charlotte Western Film Convention always had a story to tell about theatres.